Final Fantasy V: Nig-Er Su Lugal Nu-Kanpa
by Morgaine MacLir

Generic disclaimer and author's notes: FFV is copyright by
Squaresoft; this fic focuses on Gilgamesh, possibly one of the
greatest characters in both history and Final Fantasy. The one
original character mentioned in this fic is a recurring figure in
almost all my works under one name or another... so, um, please don't
kidnap the boy without asking. The title is in Sumerian, meaning
"Requiem for the Forgotten King", and the reference material used for
the background are Stephanie Dalley's translations of the Standard
Babylonian tablets found at Nineveh.  Oh, and all FFV-type info is
from my own translations, so FFAnthology's translators can bite me or
something ;).  WARNING: there are some shounen ai elements, so if
you're prone to vomiting at the very mention of love between two men,
go away ^-^.  Please mail me feedback at faris@amity.org


~\*/~


Before the two worlds merged he was to his own what Ghido was in the
Sister World: a hierophant, a sage whose every word was revered by
all.  But now, with the Library of the Ancients he called his home
sucked into the Void, he had nothing.  Nothing save for his
relationship with one of the Light Warriors and a need to keep an eye
on her.  And as a student of history, this was the perfect time to
experience the making of history first-hand.

He followed the Light Warriors, hiding in the shadows when they
turned to look back, ever thankful that the one who raised him rarely
got into any harm that couldn't be amended by her fellow warriors.
It simply would not do to reveal himself at a time like this.

The hierophant paused briefly to sit and draw out pieces of dried
meat and fruit for consumption from a small pouch hidden in the folds
of his black robes.  The monsters here could not touch him, for none
could penetrate the meter-wide forcefield he had set up around
himself.

Odd place this was... it existed, and yet it did not.  The earth
underfoot was hard-packed gypsum and rock crystal, dyed blue by the
spilling of so many monsters' blood for countless years.  The air was
dry and stale and gave him the impression that it was confined by an
invisible shell that enveloped the area and that the void beyond
truly was space.  What little vegetation there was grew only against
the jagged quartz formations that jutted out from the edges of the
ground and pulsed with unnatural light.  And, ah, the monsters...
they were plentiful, certainly, but for all their frustrated efforts
they could not attack inside his shell.

While he ate and contemplated the nature of this Cleft of Dimensions,
he heard something run towards him and paid little attention.  After
all, he was safely nested in his little fort.

And he was completely and utterly stunned when a man-like beast
tripped over him in its rush.

As he rose, the hierophant brushed his robes free of dust and stared
with wide amber eyes at the creature who had not only managed to
penetrate his shield, but actually did not see him in its path and
stumbled over his much smaller form.  The creature must have been a
man once, but now he had eight very heavily muscled arms sheathed in
brownish-grey skin.  It looked up at the boy before it with a mixture
of surprise and suspicion.

"What are you and what are you doing here, kid," the creature rasped
in a voice that was probably at one time a rich bass.  It kept its
eyes on the boy as it slowly rose and gathered its weapons that had
been scattered in its rush to escape.

"I am merely a hierophant, nothing more," the boy stated, brushing
sunset-red hair out of his face in nervousness.  "My name is Red
Halisyn, and I will not harm you if you have no ill intension for
me."

"Gilgamesh is what I was once called... I'm not sure WHAT I am
anymore."

The child-mage sat back down and gestured that Gilgamesh do the same.
After a moment's hesitation the creature did so, and there was a
flash as the forcefield extended to include the old warrior into its
protection.  Red offered his new-found associate a strip of dried
jerky.

"What were you running from?"

"Running to," the warrior corrected.  "I was running to the exit that
Butz pointed out for me.  I don't belong here."

Red pulled a few crystals of various colors and shapes and set them
in a pattern on the ground between them.  "Then where do you belong?"

An uncomfortable silence fell between the two, until at last the
warrior let out a sigh.  "In a kingdom long dead, in the past... If I
stay here I'll die in obscurity."

"Obscurity," the hierophant intoned as he finished his pattern.
"That is what you fear the most, is it not?"

At the answering nod, Red continued.  "I may be a mage, I may be a
hierophant, but my strongest passion in life has always been history.
There are too many gaps in the Ancient Library's documentation of the
Sister World, even with what Ghido and the scholars at Surgate have
told us.  You are the closest link to ExDeath that we know of.  If it
would not trouble you... would you mind telling me your story so that
I may transcribe it?"

Gilgamesh settled into a more comfortable position and crossed a few
of his arms to ponder exactly what he wanted the world to know.  It
wasn't every day a high-ranking figure like a Hierophant asked to
tell his life story to be immortalized, and he'd need to be careful.
When he looked up at the mage he noticed a bemused smile on the boy's
face.

"I can detect lies," Red stated, and gestured at the circular
pentacle the crystals were set in.  One of them, a cluster of
negative garnet crystals, glowed a dull blood red in acknowledgment.
"So I would highly advise against such actions."

"Damn.  Ah well, let me begin, shall I?

"I was born the son of King Lugulbanda of Uruk and Ninsun, his queen.
When I ascended the throne I was, admittedly, not the best choice for
the position.  I'd stir up trouble for the hell of it, abused my
status to bed anyone I took a fancy to, picked fights with the local
boys, sounded the city's klaxons just to watch people scramble madly
about.  And instead of confronting me about it, my subjects prayed to
their gods to do something about my behavior.  Weeks later, I think,
a hunter's son appealed to me in regards to a wild man who tampered
with his work, and I sent a priestess of the goddess of Love to join
the hunter and educate this man who lived as a beast so that he may
be sent to Uruk to meet me."

"Sucker for a fight, correct," the child-mage smirked as he
repositioned one of the crystals ever so slightly.  It gleamed as the
wall around them shimmered and pulled them out of the flow of time.
"This priestess, what was her name?"

"Shamhat.  Pretty girl, but too... ah... experienced for my tastes.
And the wild man was Enkidu. To continue...

"I made it custom that I was to... uh... greet any newlyweds; and one
day when I went to do so, a man with a form much like my own stood in
my path.  We grappled for a while, and I don't remember who it was
that won, but after awhile we became something more than friends.  My
mother accepted Enkidu as she would another son, and I loved him as a
man would a wife.  While the years gave Enkidu and I wives and
children, we were always in each other's company.

"One night Enkidu had a dream of a great beast with a face so
wrinkled that it took the appearance of a sacrifice's intestines and
whose breath carried fire and death, whose voice was so thunderous it
could be heard for sixty leagues.  This creature filled him with such
fear that I made it my duty to destroy it so that my friend could
sleep in peace.  Enkidu was hesitant when I told him my plans,
however, and tried to prevent me from journeying to Moore's great
forest to challenge this Humbaba.  My reason for this were threefold:
to keep it from haunting him, to cut down the great trees which I
planned to use to rebuild the gates of my city's walls, and should I
die in battle I knew Enkidu would return to Uruk and tell everyone
that I had passed on with honor.  Unable to distract me from my
self-imposed mission, he agreed, and together we set forth alone to
the great forests of Moore.

"Dreams haunted our journey but Enkidu did his best to reassure me
that they were meant to be interpreted as good omens, and yet when we
came before the Moore forests my friend became paralyzed with fear.
I kissed and comforted him with recounts of our own victories before,
and I promised to protect him.

"With my companion reassured we proceeded into the forest and
followed the well-worn track left by Humbaba.  We battled the great
monster, and when I had the thing in a deadly grip it tried to talk
me into sparing its life, and yet Enkidu encouraged me to make the
killing blow.  Now I wish I had left it to live."

"Why is that," Red asked as he turned another facet of the large
clear quartz to face Gilgamesh.  The warrior's dark brown eyes
returned to a pair of loose fists between his knees.

"Humbaba was the guardian of a four hundred year old seal, and when
Enkidu and I killed him, we broke that seal.  We cut down seven pines
that circled a withered, deformed old oak and saw to it that they
were prepared and sent by a barge to Uruk.  Sometime during the
lumber-gathering Enkidu was pricked by a splinter when he leaned
against the gnarled tree, and after being unable to pick it out he
thought that perhaps we should take the oak along as well, if for
nothing other than a carved figure depicting our victory over the
vile protector of the forest.

"For some reason or another we forgot about that one old tree, even
though it lay abandoned a short walk from my city's walls.  It was as
if the thing no longer existed.  I don't suppose you're interested in
the time I turned down a foreign princess' proposal and she sent a
weapon called a 'Bull of Heaven' after Enkidu and I, would you?"

The boy looked thoughtful as he gazed at his arrangement of recording
and ritual crystals.  There was a low hum from the milky quartz that
indicated that the recording crystal was somewhat low on energy, and
he silently cursed himself for his shortsightedness.  "I hope we can
go over that story later, for at the moment my recorder is dying and
I forgot to bring along a recharge crystal or a replacement.  Would
you continue with the main story?"

"Ana-ku igi," Gilgamesh muttered as he studied his fists with unusual
intensity.  His heart clenched as he remembered all too well what
would come next... however long ago he lost his friend, the wound was
still there, and it had yet to fully heal.

"Years passed, and Enkidu became sick with something no one could
identify.  It started with an ominous dream, and since then his
health spiraled steadily downwards until at last he died in his
sleep.  Ana-ku... Enkidu, mu ashta za e..."

"We can stop for a bit if this is too hard on you, sir," the
hierophant whispered as he dug through his robes to find a
handkerchief for his companion.  "After all, we have all the time in
the world."

"No, I'll continue...

"I stayed by his side day and night, unable to leave him; and for a
week I did not allow him to be buried.  When he was I mourned deeply
and left my city to wander alone in the wilderness.  I could not
stand being in the room we shared any longer.

"Time found me sleeping at last, in the shelter of the corpse of an
ancient oak.  The night gave me a dream in which I felt my friend,
alive and well and resting by my side.  Yet when I moved to embrace
him I felt only the rough hide of the tree in my arms and when I
tried to release it the bark had grown over my arms and roots wove
into my flesh.  I awoke with a scream, yet when I looked again at the
dead tree I felt it move ever so slightly, and I ignored it in my
preoccupation.

"Since Enkidu died I became greatly fearful of death and longed only
for immortality.  It got to the point where I would give up
everything for it, and while I thought over this a voice that was as
dark and as rich as the forests of Moore asked if I really would give
up everything.  I turned to look for the voice, and watched as the
flesh of the dead tree twisted into the face of a thin,
hungry-looking man.  It gave its name as Enuo, and offered Enkidu's
return and my own immortality if I would do as it wished.

"I gave up my country, my people, everything just to see my friend
stand before me and hold him again.  His body was the same as it had
been before his illness, yet his eyes... there was something inhuman
about them, but I ignored it and continued to do so.  For a hundred
years I did not age or die, for I allowed Enuo, who had taken the
title "He who Exceeds Death", to control me and my kingdom.  Castle
ExDeath went up where Uruk used to stand with its temples and houses,
and its walls were built of the flesh and bones of my citizens.  And
yet I turned my face from their suffering to dream of better times.

"The years passed and the Dawn Warriors came, and when they sealed
ExDeath I retreated with Enkidu.  We dwelled together at the
mountain-encased Northern Lake, and despair overtook me as I slowly
realized that there was no spirit in Enkidu's body, it was just a
shell acting out past memories.  ExDeath came again, and again I went
into battle for him with little conscious thought.  Yet always
nagging in the back of my mind was the need to set things right.

"Every time I had to battle the Light Warriors I made up an excuse
and ran away, hoping secretly that they would eliminate ExDeath and
my bond to him.  I'm here now because he had finally seen that my
incompetence was intentional."

"Thank you," Red whispered as he picked up the crystals from their
pattern and replaced them in their pouch.  "For what it counts, Lord
Gilgamesh, Castle ExDeath no longer exists, and you can rest at ease
knowing that I was the one who oversaw that the priests sent the
spirits on their way to the next life.  They have no malice for you."

"Then why does the knowledge of my inaction hang so heavily on my
heart," the ancient king asked forlornly as he rose at the boy's
unvoiced invitation.

"Conscience. It will continue to eat at you until you find a cause
worthy of your sacrifice."

The wall around them dispelled and time continued on its normal path.
Red looked up at this sad old king who had lost so much and gave a
reassuring smile.  "The Light Warriors will soon encounter a monster
that is much too powerful for them.  It is your choice to either
leave them be or aid them.  And should you die then it would be an
honorable passing."

Gilgamesh gave a thoughtful look.  He had nothing more to lose, and
it would indeed be an honorable death.  Enkidu, if his spirit was
watching, would be proud.  He then thanked the young hierophant and
proceeded to the higher tiers of the Cleft of Dimensions.

When Gilgamesh disappeared into the warp field that would take him to
his death, Red sighed and leaned against a crystalline wall.  A rosy
crystal sphere he had pulled out when Gilgamesh was telling his tale
showed the man's noble self-sacrifice, and Red replayed that scene
once again.  He walked slowly towards the warp point and checked his
memories for any mention of funeral rites of the people of the Sister
World.

As he did so his well-trained soprano rose above the din caused by
the monsters.  They paused in their howling as he sang his requiem,
and settled into dreamy stupor.  When he got back to the Library he
would sing it for his fellow scholars too, but for now it was for a
king who loved his friend so deeply that the friend's passing ripped
a great cleft in his heart which could not heal, for a king who so
loved his country that he built great walls of the finest timber for
it, for a king whom history forgot.



-~- til i-lu -~-